Louise Anna Duggan | Andrew Benson-Wilson : Early Music Reviews +

Medieval Carols by Candlelight
Angela Hicks
Patricia Hammond, May Robertson, Louise Anna Duggan, Jean Kelly
St Giles Camberwell, 11 December 2025

The vast church of St Giles Camberwell was packed with an enthusiastic audience for a magical concert of Medieval Carols by Candlelight given as part of a UK-wide tour arranged and directed by singer Angela Hicks with Patricia Hammond, voice, May Robertson, fiddle and voice, Jean Kelly, harp, and Louise Anna Duggan, percussion, all playing under the banner of Ancient Music Promotions. Their wide-ranging choice of music covered most of the genres of medieval music, ranging from the 12th-century mystic Hildegard von Bingen to the mid-17th-century, together with the music for a 15th-century poem set to music specially for this tour by the group’s percussionist, Louise Anna Duggan.

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Sing We Yule!
Joglaresa, Belinda Sykes
St Bartholomew the Less, 8 December 2019

Formed by Belinda Sykes in 1992, Joglaresa is one of the most inventive and imaginative medieval music groups around. Their lively approach to music-making might not be the most ‘authentic’ around, but they bring enticing energy and brilliant communicative skills to performance. In their early years, they were strongly influenced by the music of the Islamic Middle East, based on the specific training and musical inspiration of Belinda Sykes. But that seemed less evident in their latest incarnation in this Sunday afternoon performance in London’s St Bartholomew-the-Less. It was a short-notice event added after earlier sell-out concerts, and itself also sold out.

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